


Sojourn

by voksen



Category: Forgotten Realms
Genre: Canon Related, Chekhov's Dragon, Coda, Community: fan_flashworks, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-11-25
Updated: 2012-11-25
Packaged: 2017-11-19 12:23:57
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 588
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/573230
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/voksen/pseuds/voksen
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In which a black dragon reads some trashy Volo novels.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Sojourn

**Author's Note:**

  * For [snowynight](https://archiveofourown.org/users/snowynight/gifts).



> _"Not a drow," he said. "Though soon I might be if Hephaestus cannot help me!" Drizzt could only hope that he had piqued the dragon's curiosity. "You have heard of me, I am sure, mighty Hephaestus. I am, or was and hope to be again, Mergandevinasander of Chult, an old black of no small fame."_
> 
> _"Mergandevin...?" Hephaestus began, but the dragon let the word trail away. Hephaestus had heard of the black, of course, dragons knew the names of most of the other dragons in all the world. Hephaestus knew, too, as Drizzt had hoped he would, that Mergandevinasander had purple eyes._

News is slow to reach Chult in the best of times, and slower still to filter through the saurian-infested jungle into the heart of the swamp. To be honest, it's only by a serendipitous series of coincidences - that the latest foolish thieves to fight through to his lair were Volothamp fans to the last man, and that defeating and consuming them didn't damage the more delicate of their possessions - that Mergandevinasander finds himself in possession of _news_ at all, in the form of a large satchel of notably unmagical books.

At first he's inclined to discard them as useless clutter, but it takes too little time to arrange his new treasure to his liking; the adventurers have been poorer and poorer lately, it seems, and he spits into his back-door pool in annoyance. The water is already fouled enough there that it doesn't even sizzle pleasingly. 

Faced with a choice between going out and killing something (he's already feeling uncomfortably full with far more fatty red meat than he usually gets in a year, and as usual, reminded too late of why he always swears not to eat the whole party) or staying in and relaxing, he chooses the latter, foul mood or no.

He remembers the rest of the spoils, then, and reaches out to snare the sack of books with a claw, dragging them over and spilling them out on top of the spread of coin he rests on. The world outside of his island hasn't been of immediate interest to him in a long time - it's too far from Chult to the mainland to leave his hoard without a great deal of bother - but knowledge is always useful in itself. Even ridiculous, overblown tales of mortal champions who he will probably never encounter could hold some information as to new tactics the ones he _might_ end up dining on someday will use.

And that's when, flipping through the unlikely story of a drearily heroic outcast with delicate flicks of his talons, he spots his own name where it has no right to be. He reads the remainder of that book and the rest in a frenzy, then rereads the earlier ones before dashing them - along with half his bed - against the wall of his cave in a crashing, clattering mess. This is really just as well, because he's so furious that stray droplets of acid are splashing the rock beneath him, pitting the floor with deep, angry pocks. Mergandevinasander may have left the world outside Chult to itself, but it seems the world was not content to leave _him_ be.

Forcing his rage back as unseemly, he focuses his mind on the meticulous task of repair: a fresh coat of swamp muck laid to protect the metals from the remnants of his breath, replacing every last coin in its spot, scooping the books to the side where he can keep an eye on them properly. By the time he's finished, his usual calculating calm has returned. There is more work to be done; first he will trap his lair thoroughly enough that he can leave it unguarded while he travels. Then - well. It has been a long time since he bothered with the spell for taking a mortal form, and when he last had, it had been a human's shape, the easier to go undetected on the island.

But Mergandevinasander has no doubt that with time, power, and will - all of which he has in plenty - he will make a more than credible dark elf.


End file.
